More students want to study entrepreneurship and marketing

19 April 2016

This year's number of applicants to BI showed the largest increases for the Master programme in Strategic Marketing Management and the Bachelor of entrepreneurship and economics.

- It is gratifying to see that students have the ambition to shape their own future and maybe even start their own business. In order to meet the restructuring we now face, we have to arrange for studies that combine business subjects with an understanding of how the use of technology is becoming an increasingly important competitive advantage for future businesses, says president of BI, Inge Jan Henjesand.

The President views this development as interesting and points to rising interest in these studies as a sign of the restructuring that the current labour market is facing.

- That more students are applying for entrepreneurship studies show that young people are taking the restructuring seriously. Being able to develop business plans and models is essential in order to help develop and innovate products and services at a time when economic conditions are changing rapidly. The marketing profession has evolved significantly during the last few years and has received much attention. It is therefore important that graduates are educated to understand these changes and have an analytical approach to how markets evolve, says Henjesand.

More applicants for a master with international prestige

This year's number of applicants shows a large increase in the number of students wanting to take the BI international network master programme, Quantitative Techniques for Economics and Management (QTEM), with an increase from 42 applicants in 2015 to 77 applicants this year.

- QTEM was launched in 2013 and is designed to address students wishing to lay the foundation for a career in multinational companies. QTEM is now established as an attractive programme that attracts the most ambitious candidates in quantitative sciences, says Henjesand.

Second best applicant numbers ever

In recent years the number of applications for BI has been high and stable, and 2015 was an extraordinarily good year with a growth of 14 percent.

This year, Bachelor programmes have had 7845 applicants, against 8632 applicants in 2015 and 7720 applicants in 2014. The biggest applicant growth this year at bachelor level is for the BSc in entrepreneurship and economy (Norwegian) by 18 percent. The two largest numbers of applicants at the bachelor level were for the BSc in Business Administration (1590 applicants) and BSc in Real Estate (1389 applicants). BI is also experiencing an increase in the number of international students, and at the bachelor level is up by 6.4 percent compared with last year.

The Master studies this year have 3175 applicants, against 3247 applicants in 2015 and 2781 applicants in 2014. The most popular is the MSc in Strategic Marketing Management with an 11.6 percent increase. The two largest number of applicants at master level have been for MSc in Business (siviløkonom) (1364 applicants), and MSc in Leadership and Organizational Psychology (526 applicants).

Find something you're passionate about

- Changes happen quickly, and students must find something they are passionate about. It takes three years to finish a bachelor's degree and five years to finish a master’s degree. To think of this happening in the blink of an eye rarely pays off. A solid education provides wide opportunities in an international labour market in flux. Meanwhile, many are finding that they need to go back to school to refresh their skills throughout professional careers, says Henjesand.

Facts about BI:

• BI is with its ca. 20,000 students Europe's second largest business school, and the only business school in Norway that has the three most prestigious international accreditations a business school can get. Schools that have all three called "Triple Crown" Schools are in a separate class internationally. In 2015 there were about 70 of roughly 15,000 business schools worldwide that could adorn themselves with the Triple Crown status.

• QTEM: the international network master focusing on quantitative sciences. Comprising a total of 10 international business schools. Each partner school helps with corporate partners and can recruit up to 15-20 students.

• Each year the BI bachelor and master programmes receive over 10,000 applicants.

• The numbers of applicants stated were taken on Saturday 16 April. BI is not part of the Coordinated Admission, and it is therefore possible to apply until the semester.

• BI is an independent foundation whose purpose is solely teaching and research. All financial surplus is used to strengthen BI's academic and learning environment.